Jab'a () is a

Palestinian Palestinians () are an Arab ethnonational group native to the Levantine region of Palestine. *: "Palestine was part of the first wave of conquest following Muhammad's death in 632 CE; Jerusalem fell to the Caliph Umar in 638. The indigenous p ...

village in the central

West Bank The West Bank is located on the western bank of the Jordan River and is the larger of the two Palestinian territories (the other being the Gaza Strip) that make up the State of Palestine. A landlocked territory near the coast of the Mediter ...

, located 17 kilometers north of Hebron and 15 kilometers southwest of

Bethlehem Bethlehem is a city in the West Bank, Palestine, located about south of Jerusalem, and the capital of the Bethlehem Governorate. It had a population of people, as of . The city's economy is strongly linked to Tourism in the State of Palesti ...

. Located three kilometers east of the Green Line, it is located in the Seam Zone, surrounded by the

Israeli settlement Israeli settlements, also called Israeli colonies, are the civilian communities built by Israel throughout the Israeli-occupied territories. They are populated by Israeli citizens, almost exclusively of Israeli Jews, Jewish identity or ethni ...

s in the

Gush Etzion Regional Council The Gush Etzion Regional Council (, ''Mo'atza Azorit Gush Etzion'') is a Regional council (Israel), regional council in the northern Judean Hills, the northern part of the southern area of the West Bank, administering the Israeli settlements, se ...

and the

Israeli West Bank barrier The West Bank barrier, West Bank wall or the West Bank separation barrier, is a separation barrier built by Israel along the Green Line (Israel), Green Line and inside parts of the West Bank. Israel describes the wall as a necessary securi ...

. Nearby Palestinian towns and villages include Surif (adjacent to Jaba'a), Wadi Fukin and Nahalin to the north. It is the northernmost locality in the Hebron Governorate. According to the

Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics The Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS; ) is the official statistical institution of Palestine. Its main task is to provide credible statistical figures at the national and international levels. It is a state institution that provid ...

, Jab'a had a population of approximately 1,121 in 2017. Jab'a has a total land area of 10,099

dunam A dunam ( Ottoman Turkish, Arabic: ; ; ; ), also known as a donum or dunum and as the old, Turkish, or Ottoman stremma, was the Ottoman unit of area analogous in role (but not equal) to the Greek stremma or English acre, representing the amo ...

s, of which 1,002 dunams as built-up area.

History

Biblical connection; Byzantine period

Jab'a is mentioned in

Eusebius Eusebius of Caesarea (30 May AD 339), also known as Eusebius Pamphilius, was a historian of Christianity, exegete, and Christian polemicist from the Roman province of Syria Palaestina. In about AD 314 he became the bishop of Caesarea Maritima. ...

' renowned work, ''Onomasticon'', as '' Gabatha'' ava'ot(Γαβαθα), believed by

historical geographer Historical geography is the branch of geography that studies the ways in which geographic phenomena have changed over time. In its modern form, it is a synthesizing discipline which shares both topical and methodological similarities with histor ...

, Samuel Klein to be Jab'a southeast of Bayt Nattif. Jab'a has been identified by Conder as the biblical site of

Gibeah Gibeah (; ''Gīḇəʿā''; ''Gīḇəʿaṯ'') is the name of three places mentioned in the Hebrew Bible, in the tribes of Tribe of Benjamin, Benjamin, Tribe of Judah, Judah, and Tribe of Ephraim, Ephraim respectively. Gibeah of Benjamin, als ...

, mentioned in . Although not conclusive, it is said to be the burial-site of Habakuk the prophet. Elsewhere Eusebius purports that Habakuk was buried near a place called Ενκηλα (''`Ain Qe'ilah''), seven miles from

Bayt Jibrin Bayt Jibrin or Beit Jibrin ( lit. 'House of the Powerful') was an Arab village in the Hebron Subdistrict of British Mandatory Palestine, in what is today the State of Israel, which was depopulated during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. It was ...

, and which place is now called ''Khirbet Qila''.

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...

ceramics have been found here.

Ottoman period

Jab'a does not appear in records from the 16th century.Grossman, D. "The expansion of the settlement frontier of Hebron's western and southern fringes". '' Geography Research Forum'', 5, 1982, p. 64. Oral tradition suggests that it was founded in a later period. In 1596, Jaba appeared in Ottoman tax registers as being in the ''

Nahiya A nāḥiyah ( , plural ''nawāḥī'' ), also nahiyeh, nahiya or nahia, is a regional or local type of administrative division that usually consists of a number of villages or sometimes smaller towns. In Tajikistan, it is a second-level divisi ...

'' of Quds of the '' Liwa'' of Quds, with a population of 3

Muslim Muslims () are people who adhere to Islam, a Monotheism, monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God ...

households. The villagers paid a fixed tax-rate of 33.3% on wheat, barley, olives, and goats or beehives; a total of 1,110

akçe The ''akçe'' or ''akça'' (anglicized as ''akche'', ''akcheh'' or ''aqcha''; ; , , in Europe known as '' asper'') was a silver coin mainly known for being the chief monetary unit of the Ottoman Empire. It was also used in other states includi ...

. Local tradition suggests Jab'a inhabitants came from Beit Suweir, founding the village following an assault on their previous settlement by the Ta'amreh tribe, an event that likely occurred in the 18th century. In 1863, the French explorer

Victor Guérin Victor Guérin (; 15 September 1821 – 21 September 1890) was a French people, French intellectual, explorer and amateur archaeologist. He published books describing the geography, archeology and history of the areas he explored, which included ...

found Jab'a reduced to a hundred souls, while the

Palestine Exploration Fund The Palestine Exploration Fund is a British society based in London. It was founded in 1865, shortly after the completion of the Ordnance Survey of Jerusalem by Royal Engineers of the War Department. The Fund is the oldest known organization i ...

's '' Survey of Western Palestine'' described Jeba in 1883 as "a small village standing upon a high, narrow ridge, with a steep valley to the north. The houses are of stone. To the east are caves in the face of the rock."Conder and Kitchener, 1883, SWP III, p
25
/ref>

British Mandate

In the

1922 census of Palestine The 1922 census of Palestine was the first census carried out by the authorities of the British Mandate of Palestine, on 23 October 1922. The reported population was 757,182, including the military and persons of foreign nationality. The divis ...

conducted by the British Mandate authorities, Al Jaba'a had a population of 122 inhabitants, all

s.Barron, 1923, Table V, Sub-district of Hebron, p
10
/ref> while at the time of the 1931 census, El Jab'a had a population of 176, still Muslim, living in a total of 36 houses.Mills, 1932, p
32
/ref> In the 1945 statistics the population of El Jab'a was 210, all Muslims, who owned 5,593

s of land according to an official land and population survey. 102 dunams were plantations and irrigable land, 1,880 used for cereals, while 12 dunams were built-up (urban) land.

Jordanian rule

In the wake of the

1948 Arab–Israeli War The 1948 Arab–Israeli War, also known as the First Arab–Israeli War, followed the 1947–1948 civil war in Mandatory Palestine, civil war in Mandatory Palestine as the second and final stage of the 1948 Palestine war. The civil war becam ...

, and after the

1949 Armistice Agreements The 1949 Armistice Agreements were signed between Israel and Egypt,Jordanian rule. The Jordanian census of 1961 found 332 inhabitants.

1967 and aftermath

Since the

Six-Day War The Six-Day War, also known as the June War, 1967 Arab–Israeli War or Third Arab–Israeli War, was fought between Israel and a coalition of Arab world, Arab states, primarily United Arab Republic, Egypt, Syria, and Jordan from 5 to 10June ...

in 1967, Jab'a has been held under

Israeli occupation Israel has occupied the Golan Heights of Syria and the Palestinian territories since the Six-Day War of 1967. It has previously occupied the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt and southern Lebanon as well. Prior to 1967, control of the Palestinian terr ...

. After the 1995 accords, 3.5% of village land was classified as Area B land, while the remaining 96.5% was classified as Area C. Israel has put Jab'a inside the

Gush Etzion Gush Etzion (, ' Etzion Bloc) is a cluster of Israeli settlements located in the Judaean Mountains, directly south of Jerusalem and Bethlehem in the West Bank. The core group includes four Jewish agricultural villages that were founded in 1943� ...

block, effectively isolating it from its Palestinian neighbours. The

will extend on Al Jab’a lands, isolating 90% of Jab'a's land from the village. On 25 February 2015, in an apparent price tag attack, a mosque in the village was torched. Israeli police were investigating it. The attack coincided with the anniversary of the Cave of the Patriarchs massacre that took place in Hebron 21 years ago. The fire was discovered by worshipers who quickly extinguished it. The carpets and walls were damaged but no one was reported to have been injured. Graffiti in Hebrew called for "revenge attacks" against Arabs and Muslims, according to eyewitnesses. In October 2020, Israeli settlers destroyed 300 olive trees in the northern part of the village. The village houses are small and consist of just one spacious room surrounded by a large area of farmland, on which almonds and olives and grapes are cultivated.Jab'aa
Centre for Cultural Heritage Preservation.

Where did they come from

According to a report by

Applied Research Institute–Jerusalem The Applied Research Institute - Jerusalem (ARIJ; ) is a Palestinian NGO founded in 1990 with its main office in Bethlehem in the West Bank. ARIJ is actively working on research projects in the fields of management of natural resources, water m ...

, the people of Jab'a village can trace their roots back to 1948 when they originally came from the villages of Rafat and Sajartah.Al Jab’a Village
ARIJ, p. 5

References

Bibliography

* * * * * * * * * * *

External links

Palestine Remembered
Jaba
Welcome to Palestine *Survey of Western Palestine, Map 17
IAA

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Al Jab'a Village (Fact Sheet)

, ARIJ
Al Jab’a Village
ARIJ
Al Jab'a aerial photo
ARIJ
The priorities and needs for development in Al Jab’a village based on the community and the local authorities’ assessment
ARIJ
Al Jab’a
{{Bethlehem Governorate Seam Zone Bethlehem Governorate Villages in the West Bank